Rose Conway-Walsh (Mayo, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

We would not be here this evening if the Minister had used the findings of the OAK consultation with the survivors of the mother and baby homes. Nobody wants to be here, at least of all the people who are watching in tonight. The survivors do not want to be watching this. I send them our solidarity. I thank all of those who have engaged with Deputies across the House and told us their stories.

Some of those who are watching tonight have raised a couple of things with me since the debate started. The Minister says he has sought to seek consensus rather than division in the House, but I have been asked why he is continuously trying to create a divide between survivors. He needs to hear that going out of this Chamber tonight. He needs to include it in the legislation he is bringing forward. The Minister also said that the Government has gone significantly further, when he referred to what the Government has done. They say that this is not far enough. If they say that it is not far enough, it is not far enough. The Minister said that this is the largest scheme of its kind in the history of the State, but they want to remind him that it is the largest and most inhumane scandal in the history of the State. The Minister has to listen, even at this late stage.

I want to remember tonight the tenacity and courage of Catherine Corless in uncovering the scandal of the 796 babies still in the sewage tanks in Tuam. Some 208 of them are from my own county of Mayo. I want to acknowledge the recent initiatives by Valerie Jennings and Seosamh Mulchrone to highlight that to the Minister. That needs to be done. I ask the Minister, please, to listen to the survivors.

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